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Tweet Zoo
Tweet Zoo is a 1957 Merrie Melodies short directed by Friz Freleng. Title The title is a play on the 1928 song "Sweet Sue". Plot A zoo guide gives a tour to its customers various wild animals, including an African rhinoceros (who appears to have a bandaged horn), a Bengal tiger named Terry who reacts through poetry and motion, and a North American skunk (which involves both the zoo guide and the customers fleeing away very quickly when they encounter the skunk due to its bad odor). Then, the zoo guide points out their rare Tweety Bird specimen, and once the rest of the tour heads over to the monkey cages, Sylvester stays behind at Tweety's cage, opens the cage and begins to chase him. Tweety flies into the bear pit. Ignoring the "DO NOT TEASE THE ANIMALS" warning sign placed nearby the bear pit, Sylvester tries to catch him with a net on a long pole, but accidentally annoys the bear with it. The angry bear grabs the pole, pulls Sylvester to him, and clobbers the cat, which Tweety mistakes it for teddy bear playing with the putty tat. When Sylvester escapes, he paces by the fence until he hatches a new plan. He hides in the animals' feed cart and waits, but the feeder unknowingly tosses the cat to the Bengal tigers, along with the other steaks. And once the scene cuts over to the two Bengal tigers who were fed the steaks, it reveals that one of them has eaten Sylvester, but doesn't like the taste of it. Sylvester narrowly escapes the jaws of one of the Bengal tigers that ate him. Meanwhile, Tweety feeds the elephant peanuts, but is sucked up inside the elephant's trunk and then blown back out. When Sylvester escapes the tigers, Tweety hides in a hole in the elephant pen and the elephant then steps on top of it. Sylvester fails to lift the foot off the hole, so he gets mad and kicks it, hurting himself of course. When he winds up a toy mouse to scare it, the elephant leaps in the air and lands on Sylvester. Tweety flies to the alligator pond. Sylvester paces and thinks near the lion cage. The lion roars and interrupts him so he grabs a nearby oar and beats the lion with it. Then he sees there was a boat next to the oar, so he drags it into the pond. As he rows toward Tweety, he realizes the lion is in the back of the boat with him so he skedaddles back to shore. The heavy lion upends the boat and has to fend off the alligators. When it gets back to shore, it finds Sylvester and dunks him in the alligator pond, then boots him back into the bear pit, where he gets attacked by the same bear again off-screen for the second time, but narrowly escapes. Sylvester tries to pole vault over the alligators, but Tweety tosses a banana peel right where the pole hits, and Sylvester slides right into the pond. He manages to escape by clubbing the gators with his broken pole. Frustrated, he leaves the zoo and crosses birds of his diet list, and immediately, other birds begin landing on him. As Sylvester leaves the zoo, he mumbles "Sufferin' succotash! What a fine time to pick to go on a diet!" Availability * (1996) VHS - Stars of Space Jam: Sylvester and Tweety * (2001) DVD - I Love Tweety: Volume 2 (restored) * (2018) DVD - Stars of Space Jam: Sylvester and Tweety Notes * At the ending of this cartoon where Sylvester crosses off birds from his diet list, Sylvester's diet list consists of birds, fish, mice, milk and cream, with birds being on top of the list. * The animation of Sylvester's flattened toes reshaping back to their original shape after kicking the elephant was reused animation from "Kit for Cat". Gallery Tweetzoo.jpeg|Title Card (Before Remastering) Tweetzoo.png|Title Card (I Love Tweety Japanese DVD remastered version) External Links Tweet Zoo on the SFX Resource Category:Cartoons directed by Friz Freleng Category:Tweety Cartoons Category:Sylvester Cartoons Category:Shorts Category:1957 Category:Merrie Melodies Shorts Category:Blue Ribbon reissues Category:Cartoons written by Warren Foster Category:Cartoons with layouts by Hawley Pratt Category:Cartoons with backgrounds by Irv Wyner Category:Cartoons with music by Milt Franklyn Category:Cartoons with film editing by Treg Brown Category:Cartoons with sound effects edited by Treg Brown Category:Cartoons with orchestrations by Milt Franklyn Category:Cartoons with characters voiced by Mel Blanc Category:Cartoons produced by Eddie Selzer